My VW had a Type 4 engine fitted last year. Yes it goes out as a hire van so gets a good bit of use. About 20K miles per year. Only non stock component in engine was the Webcam 107i from Razzyh old engine. However after one hire the hirer drove back perfectly normally cruising at 70mph, parked up, but when I went to start her she sounded awful. The noise was intermittant and would go away sometimes, but a knocking like this is not good. The last bit of work I did to her was taking off her Solexes and replacing them with IDF's. I changed the solexes because the engine was running lean. The plugs were white and the engine smelt hot. The youtube video is above. Compression is excellent, although I did get a reading of 90 on one cylinder , but a few repeats and it was back up to 135. Lets see who gets the fault diagnosed right before I split the case.
Hydraulic cam and presumably hydraulic followers? The racket might be a broken follower or it won’t pump up. Easy enough to check without splitting the case. Which cylinder had the low compression? Perhaps you shouldn’t expect more than 20K miles carefully driven by numerous hirers with probably little or no knowledge of air-cooled engines – just factor in the cost of a new engine in your hire charge. ‘…the hirer drove back perfectly normally cruising at 70mph…’ yeah right.
Compression loss on number 1 cylinder. Rockers looked good, Heads removed. Number 1 cylinder oily. All other cylinders good. Con Rods bearings good, no play. However noticed the remains of some spring washers in the sump near the cam gear. Then I found the culprit.
Wowah!.. has the spindle on the oil pump gear moved out? Hitting the bolts on the way past and knocking the all along a bit... got a spare one if you need Holes in all the right places just needs a quick skim to allow for bolt heads Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk
Thanks Guys. I drove down to CoolAirVW and picked up a new cam gear. I noticed for a few months the engine was running very lean. Put it down to worn solexes. The noise was probably the bolts loosening just enough to start hitting the pump. I am lucky the valves did not smack into the head. All the vans have trackers and yes the guy was cruising at 78 mph! , but I am pretty certain that he did not cause this. Most hirers are really respectful of the vans. All I have to do is not get attached to them and just think of them as a source of income. New Cam Gear on and bolts threadlocked. Engine put back together, finished at 2am this morning and van collected and now in Cornwall. All I need to do now is wait for my CSP bell crank linkage for Type 4 as the CB Hex bar linkage from Dellorto.co.uk is pants.
